Edgedancer: The Stormlight Archive, #2.5

By Brandon Sanderson

From Brandon Sanderson comes a short novel of the #1 New York Times bestselling Stormlight Archive (previously published in Arcanum Unbounded).

Three years ago, Lift asked a goddess to stop her from growing older—a wish she believed was granted. Now, in Edgedancer, the barely teenage nascent Knight Radiant finds that time stands still for no one. Although the young Azish emperor granted her safe haven from an executioner she knows only as Darkness, court life is suffocating the free-spirited Lift, who can't help heading to Yeddaw when she hears the relentless Darkness is there hunting people like her with budding powers. The downtrodden in Yeddaw have no champion, and Lift knows she must seize this awesome responsibility.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dragonsteel Entertainment LLC
• Release date: Apr 6, 2023
• ISBN: 9781938570353

Brandon Sanderson

Brandon Sanderson grew up in Lincoln, Nebraska. He lives in Utah with his wife and children and teaches creative writing at Brigham Young University. His bestsellers have sold 32 million copies worldwide and include the Mistborn saga; the Stormlight Archive novels; and other novels, including The Rithmatist, Steelheart, and Skyward. He won a Hugo Award for The Emperor's Soul, a novella set in the world of his acclaimed first novel, Elantris. Additionally, he completed Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time®. Visit his website for behind-the-scenes information on all his books.

Book preview

PROLOGUE

Lift had never robbed a palace before. Seemed like a dangerous thing to try. Not because she might get caught, but because once you robbed a starvin’ palace, where did you go next?

She climbed up onto the outer wall and looked in at the grounds. Everything inside—trees, rocks, buildings—reflected the starlight in an odd way. A bulbous-looking building stuck up in the middle of it all, like a bubble on a pond. In fact, most of the buildings were that same round shape, often with small protrusions sprouting out of the top. There wasn’t a straight line in the whole starvin’ place. Just lots and lots of curves.

Lift’s companions climbed up to peek over the top of the wall. A scuffling, scrambling, rowdy mess they were. Six men, supposedly master thieves. They couldn’t even climb a wall properly.

The Bronze Palace itself, Huqin breathed.

Bronze? Is that what everythin’ is made of? Lift asked, sitting on the wall with one leg over the side. Looks like a bunch of breasts.

The men stared at her, aghast. They were all Azish, with dark skin and hair. She was Reshi, from the islands up north. Her mother had told her that, though Lift had never seen the place.

What? Huqin demanded.

Breasts, Lift said, pointing. "See, like a lady layin’ on her back. Those points on the tops are nipples. Bloke who built this place musta been single for a looong time."

Huqin turned to one of his companions. Using their ropes, they scuttled back down the outside of the wall to hold a whispered conference.

Grounds at this end look empty, as my informant indicated would be the case, Huqin said. He was in charge of the lot of them. Had a nose like someone had taken hold of it when he was a kid and pulled real, real hard. Lift was surprised he didn’t smack people in the face with it when he turned.

Everyone’s focused on choosing the new Prime Aqasix, said Maxin. We could really do this. Rob the Bronze Palace itself, and right under the nose of the vizierate.

Is it…um…safe? asked Huqin’s nephew. He was in his teens, and puberty hadn’t been kind to him. Not with that face, that voice, and those spindly legs.

Hush, Huqin snapped.

No, Tigzikk said, the boy is right to express caution. This will be very dangerous.

Tigzikk was considered the learned one in the group on account of his being able to cuss in three languages. Downright scholarly, that was. He wore fancy clothing, while most of the others wore black. There will be chaos, Tigzikk continued, because so many people move through the palace tonight, but there will also be danger. Many, many bodyguards and a likelihood of suspicion on all sides.

Tigzikk was an aging fellow, and was the only one of the group Lift knew well. She couldn’t say his name. That quq sound on the end of his name sounded like choking when someone pronounced it correctly. She just called him Tig instead.

Tigzikk, Huqin said. Yup. Choking. You were the one who suggested this. Don’t tell me you’re getting cold now.

I’m not backing down. I’m pleading caution.

Lift leaned over the wall toward them. Less arguing, she said. Let’s move. I’m hungry.

Huqin looked up. "Why did we bring her along?"

She’ll be useful, Tigzikk said. You’ll see.

She’s just a child!

She’s a youth. She’s at least twelve.

"I ain’t twelve," Lift snapped, looming over them.

They turned up toward her.

I ain’t, she said. Twelve’s an unlucky number. She held up her hands. I’m only this many.

…Ten? Tigzikk asked.

Is that how many that is? Sure, then. Ten. She lowered her hands. If I can’t count it on my fingers, it’s unlucky. And she’d been that many for three years now. So there.

Seems like there are a lot of unlucky ages, Huqin said, sounding amused.

Sure are, she agreed. She scanned the grounds again, then glanced back the way they had come, into the city.

A man walked along one of the streets leading to the palace. His dark clothing blended into the gloom, but his silver buttons glinted each time he passed a streetlight.

Storms, she thought, a chill running up her spine. I didn’t lose him after all.

She looked down at the men. "Are you coming with me or not? ’Cuz I’m leaving." She slipped over the top and dropped into the palace yards. Lift squatted there, feeling the cold ground. Yup, it was metal. Everything was bronze. Rich people, she decided, loved to stick with a theme.

As the boys finally stopped arguing and started climbing, a thin, twisting trail of vines grew out of the darkness and approached Lift. It looked like a little stream of spilled water picking its way across the floor. Here and there, bits of clear crystal peeked out of the vines, like sections of quartz in otherwise dark stone. Those weren’t sharp, but smooth like polished glass, and didn’t glow with Stormlight.

The vines grew super-fast, curling about one another in a tangle that formed a face.

Mistress, the face said. "Is this wise?"

’Ello, Voidbringer, Lift said, scanning the grounds.

"I am not a Voidbringer! he said. And you know it. Just…just stop saying that!"

Lift grinned. You’re my pet Voidbringer, and no lies are going to change that. I got you captured. No stealing souls, now. We ain’t here for souls. Just a little thievery, the type what never hurt nobody.

The vine face—he called himself Wyndle—sighed. Lift scuttled across the bronze ground over to a tree that was, of course, also made of bronze. Huqin had chosen the darkest part of night, between moons, for them to slip in—but the starlight was enough to see by on a cloudless night like this.

Wyndle grew up to her, leaving a small trail of vines that people didn’t seem to be able to see. The vines hardened after a few moments of sitting, as if briefly becoming solid crystal, then they crumbled to dust. People spotted that on occasion, though they certainly couldn’t see Wyndle himself.

I’m a spren, Wyndle said to her. Part of a proud and noble—

Hush, Lift said, peeking out from behind the bronze tree. An open-topped carriage passed on the drive beyond, carrying some important Azish folk. You could tell by the coats. Big, drooping coats with really wide sleeves and patterns that argued with each other. They all looked like kids who had snuck into their parents’ wardrobe. The hats were nifty, though.

The thieves followed behind her, moving with reasonable stealth. They really weren’t that bad. Even if they didn’t know how to climb a wall properly.

They gathered around her, and Tigzikk stood up, straightening his coat—which was an imitation of one of those worn by the rich scribe types who worked in the government. Here in Azir, working for the government was real important. Everyone else was said to be discrete, whatever that meant.

Ready? Tigzikk said to Maxin, who was the other one of the thieves dressed in fine clothing.

Maxin nodded, and the two of them moved off to the right, heading toward the palace’s sculpture garden. The important people would supposedly be shuffling around in there, speculating about who should be the next Prime.

Dangerous job, that. The last two had gotten their heads chopped off by some bloke in white with a Shardblade. The most recent Prime hadn’t lasted two starvin’ days!

With Tigzikk and Maxin gone, Lift only had four others to worry about. Huqin, his nephew, and two slender brothers who didn’t talk much and kept reaching under their coats for knives. Lift didn’t like their type. Thieving shouldn’t leave bodies. Leaving bodies was easy. There was no challenge to it if you could just kill anyone who spotted you.

"You can get us in, Huqin said to Lift. Right?"

Lift pointedly rolled her eyes. Then she scuttled across the bronze grounds toward the main palace structure.

Really does look like a breast…

Wyndle curled along the ground beside her, his vine trail sprouting tiny bits of clear crystal here and there. He was as sinuous and speedy as a moving eel, only he grew rather than actually moving. Voidbringers were a strange lot.

"You realize that I didn’t choose you, he said, a face appearing in the vines as they moved. His speaking left a strange effect, the trail behind him clotted with a sequence of frozen faces. The mouth seemed to move because it was growing so quickly beside her. I wanted to pick a distinguished Iriali matron. A grandmother, an accomplished gardener. But no, the Ring said we should choose you. ‘She has visited the Old Magic,’ they said. ‘Our mother has blessed her,’ they said. ‘She will be young, and we can mold her,’ they said. Well, they don’t have to put up with—"

Shut it, Voidbringer, Lift hissed, drawing up beside the wall of the palace. Or I’ll bathe in blessed water and go listen to the priests. Maybe get an exorcism.

Lift edged sideways until she could look around the curve of the wall to spot the guard patrol: men in patterned vests and caps, with long halberds. She looked up the side of the wall. It bulged out just above her, like a rockbud, before tapering up further. It was of smooth bronze, with no handholds.

She waited until the guards had walked farther away. All right, she whispered to Wyndle. You gotta do what I say.

"I do not."

Sure you do. I captured you, just like in the stories.

"I came to you, Wyndle said. Your powers come from me! Do you even listen to—"

Up the wall, Lift said, pointing.

Wyndle sighed, but obeyed, creeping up the wall in a wide, looping pattern. Lift hopped up, grabbing the small handholds made by the vine, which stuck to the surface by virtue of thousands of branching stems with sticky discs on them. Wyndle wove ahead of her, making a ladder of sorts.

It wasn’t easy. It was starvin’ difficult, with that bulge, and Wyndle’s handholds weren’t very big. But she did it, climbing all the way to the near-top of the building’s dome, where windows peeked out at the grounds.

She glanced toward the city. No sign of the man in the black uniform. Maybe she’d lost him.

She turned back to examine the window. Its nice wooden frame held very thick glass, even though it pointed east. It was unfair how well Azimir was protected from highstorms. They should have to live with the wind, like normal folk.

We need to Voidbring that, she said, pointing at the window.

Have you realized, Wyndle said, "that while you claim to be a master thief, I do all of the work in this relationship?"

You do all the complainin’ too, she said. How do we get through this?

You have the seeds?

She nodded, fishing in her pocket. Then in the other one. Then in her back pocket. Ah, there they were. She pulled out a handful of seeds.

I can’t affect the Physical Realm except in minor ways, Wyndle said. This means that you will need to use Investiture to—

Lift yawned.

Use Investiture to—

She yawned wider. Starvin’ Voidbringers never could catch a hint.

Wyndle sighed. Spread the seeds on the frame.

She did so, throwing the handful of seeds at the window.

Your bond to me grants two primary classes of ability, Wyndle said. The first, manipulation of friction, you’ve already—don’t yawn at me!—discovered. We have been using that well for many weeks now, and it is time for you to learn the second, the power of Growth. You aren’t ready for what was once known as Regrowth, the healing of—

Lift pressed her hand against the seeds, then summoned her awesomeness.

She wasn’t sure how she did it. She just did. It had started right around when Wyndle had first appeared.

He hadn’t talked then. She kind of missed those days.

Her hand glowed faintly with white light, like vapor coming off the skin. The seeds that saw the light started to grow. Fast. Vines burst from the seeds and wormed into the cracks between the window and its frame.

The vines grew at her will, making constricted, straining sounds. The glass cracked, then the window frame popped open.

Lift grinned.

Well done, Wyndle said. We’ll make an Edgedancer out of you yet.

Her stomach grumbled. When had she last eaten? She’d used a lot of her awesomeness practicing earlier. She probably should have stolen something to eat. She wasn’t quite so awesome when she was hungry.

She slipped inside the window. Having a Voidbringer was useful, though she wasn’t completely sure her powers came from him. That seemed the sorta thing a Voidbringer would lie about. She had captured him, fair and square. She’d used words. A Voidbringer had no body, not really. To catch something like that, you had to use words. Everybody knew it. Just like curses made evil things come find you.

She had to get out a sphere—a diamond mark, her lucky one—to see properly in here. The small bedroom was decorated after the Azish way with lots of intricate patterns on the rugs and the fabric on the walls, mostly gold and red here. Those patterns were everything to the Azish. They were like words.

She looked out the window. Surely she’d escaped Darkness, the man in the black and silver with the pale crescent birthmark on his cheek. The man with the dead, lifeless stare. Surely he hadn’t followed her all the way from Marabethia. That was half a continent away! Well, a quarter one, at the least.

Convinced, she uncoiled the rope that she wore wrapped around her waist and over her shoulders. She tied it to the door of a built-in closet, then fed it out the window. It tightened as the men started climbing. Nearby, Wyndle grew up around one of the bedposts, coiled like a skyeel.

She heard whispered voices below. "Did you see that? She climbed right up it. Not a handhold in sight. How…?"

Hush. That was Huqin.

Lift began poking through cabinets and drawers as the boys clambered in the window one at a time. Once inside, the thieves pulled up the rope and shut the window as best they could. Huqin studied the vines she’d grown from seeds on the frame.

Lift stuck her head in the bottom of a wardrobe, groping around. Ain’t nothing in this room but moldy shoes.

You, Huqin said to her, and my nephew will hold this room. The three of us will search the bedrooms nearby. We will be back shortly.

"You’ll probably have a whole sack of moldy shoes…" Lift said, pulling out of the wardrobe.

Ignorant child, Huqin said, pointing at the wardrobe. One of his men grabbed the shoes and outfits inside, stuffing them in a sack. This clothing will sell for bundles. It’s exactly what we’re looking for.

What about real riches? Lift said. Spheres, jewelry, art… She had little interest in those things herself, but she’d figured it was what Huqin was after.

"That will all be far too well guarded, Huqin said as his two associates made quick work of the room’s clothing. The difference between a successful thief and

Reviews for Edgedancer

[bangerlm · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Fun and funny. :)

[bookworm12_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A short novella focused on one of the side characters from the Stormlight Archives. Lift is a brash young girl with powers beyond her comprehension. It was fun and light, but it didn’t keep my interest as much as the rest of the series.

[dhmontgomery-265379 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

An excellent novella (albeit one that will make little sense without the context of Sanderson's already daunting Stormlight Archive series). This is a bit of character development he thought was necessary but too tangential to put into his main books, but the story is gripping and the thematic resonances interesting. It apparently will also greatly enhance one's experience reading Book 3 in the series, which I've already begun.

[willszal-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

There's a lovely simplicity to this book. The entire story is told from the perspective of one character.Last winter I read the three main books that are out thus far in the Stormlight Archive. This book is a considered "2.5," a side story. Supposedly a year from now the four book in the series will be released.

[wyvernfriend · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

LIft is an interesting character but I don't know that I could read a full novel that concentrated on her. She's an agent of chaos. Stealing when she can, particularly food but also being a a Knight Radiant, without really realising what this means, mostly because of her background. She's trying to find out why a man, an executioner called Darkness is killing knights radiant. It gives some interesting breath to the world but I really don't like Lift.

[mattries37315 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Traveling from the palace of the Azish emperor to the carved out city of Yeddaw, a young Knight Radiant stalks her would be executioner even as a danger to her world stalks the land. Brandon Sanderson’s Edgedancer is a tale from the Stormlight Archive set in-between the second and third volumes of the main series as it shows the how Lift, the titular Edgedancer, and a long surviving Herald react to the Everstorm.Feeling confined and unsure, the adventurous theft Lift travels to the city of Yeddaw to find more Radiants before they are murdered by Darkness. The teenager displays her Edgedancer talents to draw the attention of her would be executioner while also exploring the city and trying to figure out its people. Her tactics pay off as Darkness learns she’s in the city and she follows him to discover what he knows only to find out that Darkness has Radiant apprentices of his own including a man in white. Eventually Lift is forced to use her connections with the Azish emperor to find out who Darkness is searching for only to discover that his apprentices had made a mistake and that the unlikeable woman Lift has had several encounters will is his target. But it is during their confrontation that Lift convinces Darkness, the Herald Nale, that the Everstorm hitting the city means a new Desolation has arrived.Although this book comes in at roughly 270 pages, the first 58 being a reprinting of Lift’s Interlude in Words of Radiance, the small hardback volume that it appears in makes it seem longer than it is. In a postscript, Sanderson wrote that this novella was needed before both characters appear again in Oathbringer thus meaning for that anyone reading the series this short little story is something they might want to quickly read. Given it’s short length, Sanderson packs a lot into it as he wants to describe the city of Yeddaw as well as continue to develop Lift—who he is not shy in saying he enjoys writing—in both her understanding of who she is and in giving readers hints about what the “Nightwatcher” gave her instead of her request to remain 10 years old.Edgedancer is a quick, fun read about young adventurous character looking to figure herself out and in the process helping an age-old hero begin to regain his focus on what the world of Roshar needs. Even though you’ll need to have read earlier volumes of the Stormlight Archive to understand the magical system and world it take place in.

[karlstar_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is a very short novel. My version is hardcover and is 268 pages, but they are teeny tiny pages with a decent sized font, so this is really more of a 120 - 150 page novel. This one is really for fans of the Stormlight Archive series, it will be difficult to digest if you aren't familiar with the world, politics or magic systems of his series. On the other hand, this book is quite fun. It chronicles a short period of time in the life of the young girl Lift, one of the few (and self-taught) Radiants, people imbued with very special powers. In her case, her power is control over friction. Essentially it is a sci-fi superhero novel, if the superhero is all about helping poor people and not hurting anyone. I wish all of his writing was so concise.

[guide2_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Very good mostly self-contained story (if you're read the 2 previous books). Obviously you only want more of it once it's over...

[dbhart42 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I loved this novella! Lift gets an appropriately dedicated story and we learn about Szeth and the Skybreakers. Awesomeness abounds!

[kinwolf · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Lift is so fun to read. She's.. well, awesome. A fun read, and it was interesting to read how she always seem to do something for a reason, but how she always tries to tell herself it's not for that reason she's doing it. Fun fun fun. Loved the format and price too.